Another "original" question.the early GTO's
 

Hey guys,another question or two.I have been advised by several folks,whose opinion I value,(not you Keith) that the water pump pulley on my 65 should have been plated ,not painted black,like Jim Mott did in the early 90's.Anyone have the answer? Is mine wrong?
Or did it depend on the factory,etc? thanks Larry B.

Larry, which W.P. Pulley do you have? I don't think it matters, I believe they were all painted black in '64 & '65.

But if there is debate, it is useful to know which pulley is in question.

The '65 2 groove 8" dia. pulley was p/n 9778808, not the same as used in '64.

The '65 1 groove 8" dia. pulley (used with no options) was p/n 544595, same pulley used for the no option V8 applications in the Tempest & big Pontiac since '63.

The '65 2 groove 7-3/8" dia. pulley (used with A/C applications) was p/n 9781739, not used except in '65.

The 9778808 and the 544595 were also used in '66 and then retired.

I'm not sure about the 544595 pulley, but the '65 9778808 pulleys that I have ever seen all had the p/n stamped on them (and perhaps a manifest code as well).

Only reason I know anything at all about them is because years ago I searched for a '64 2 groove W.P. pulley. Had a hard time locating one, partly because I believe the '64 pulley was not stamped with a p/n. But I came across numerous stamped 9778808 pulleys during my quest.

Tough one Larry. Here is a pic from the infamous 1500 mile 65 Tripower GTO. Looks like the pulley is black, no zinc plated. On a 65 Scott Tiemann restored car, he plated it bright zinc. I can say for sure my 66 pulley (PS, no A/C) was zinc plated and not black. Not sure if it has anything to do with if it was a PS, A/C, or A.I.R. car or not, but would be good to know.

Hmmm, Norm, with PS & no A/C, your W.P pulley should be p/n 9778808, right?

I wonder if maybe they switched from painted to plated for '66? And if they did, there is a chance they made the change prior to the end of the '65 MY.

Found this on ebay:

http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/1966-...item5887cf3e8c

Not much to go on but the guy says 9778808 (see item specifics for p/n) for a '66 Catalina. I assume he must have pulled it from a '66 Cat so that is why he advertised it for that application. I can only assume it is an original factory installed pulley.

Sure looks like it was not painted to me.

And if it was zinc plated, that would match Norm's '66 pulley, so that would be consistent for a '66 9778808.

But I still believe for '65 the 9778808 will usually be painted black. Hopefully more input will follow.

Larry, since the pulleys were same for big Pontiacs, suggest you try the same question in the big Pontiac forum.

Dick Bridges had a 11,000 mile '65 Tiger Gold tri power 4 speed car and the pulley on it was plated, 1st one I'd ever seen that wasn't black and he said it was correct. I think Tieman done the detail work on it. I got a couple of pics of it but they're exterior only. I do have a pulley at another location that is on my '65's original engine and it is plated, not sure if it is the original pulley or not.

John V.and others,I have the single groove pulley(#544595) but,there is no P/N

stamped on the back.I know a member here and in our club,talked about this weeks ago

over the phone.He has two 64 GTO's.He brought a pulley to the meeting to show me,

a fairly good example.It was plated.But,I can't remember if it was a single groove or not.

Perhaps Tom will see this post and chime in. Larry B.

Larry, if what I suggested proves true, then the 544595 might have been plated for '66 use and even for a time in '65.

Is Keith's very early '65 544595 Pulley painted black? I suspect it is. If later '65 examples were plated then I would guess there was a running change. If so, you'd have to figure out the approx. time frame for the change to decide if yours was originally painted or not. That would be quite the challenge.

Did the guy with the '64s suggest his pulleys were original? That would be very hard to swallow on a '64. I lean to the idea that they were all one way up to a point in time and seems to me that point in time had to have been at least into the '65 MY.

Then again, it could have been a deal like the '64 Horn Relay, some one way, others another, possibly depending on a vendor choice. I have no idea if PMD made their own pulleys or bought them from vendors.

I'm pretty sure by '66 the 544595 pulleys were stamped with a p/n but also pretty certain that the p/ns were not stamped on the pulleys until at least '65.

Again, I'd check with the big car guys since some of them should be familiar with the 8" single groove pulley in '63 thru '66 cars and may have some original cars to check.

Meaning "I did not advise you" - or - "you don't value my opinion"?

(lol)

Mine is black (both the water pump pulley and the crank pulley are black).

I can also check the car in Henry Ford museum, which is a later build and is a PS/PB/AC car.

K

John, mine 66 zinc plated pulley is a 9778808. It's a December 65 build date car. Time to find some more unrestored cars!

Took a look at the '64 and '65 road test articles to see what they might tell us. For '64, all of the two-groove w/p pulleys were plated. The single-groove pulleys were painted black. For '65 I only found one picture of the w/p pulley. It was a two-groove pulley and it was plated.

I also located one '66 two-groove pulley that was plated. This may reveal a pattern.?.?

Another "original" question, the early GTO's
 

December 2000 High Perf Pontiac article on 1326 original mile '65 page 39 and 40 clearly shows painted wp pulley.

Did you see it before or after Tieman detailed it; which was sometimes in the early 90's?

My experience supports some of the other posters. I've never seen a 65, including low mileage, UNTOUCHED, originals with anything except black. 66's are another story altogether. One that I remember in particular was an untouched 19,000 mile original car that I owned back in the late 80's. Automatic, air, ps car and the pulley was PLATED silver zinc.

But again, this could be one of those deals where a 2 or 3 suppliers were used during the year. I would leave it black.

Because Scott Tieman's Father bought a 1965 GTO "Tri-Power 4-speed car" NEW and the family still owns the car, I would say that Scott has a pretty good handle on what that specific car was built with. The deal is: "what where the options on his father's car and when was it built?"

Tom Vaught

ps Tieman has had access to some of the "Big Money" car collections BEFORE the cars were restored so again he has some pretty good info to go by.

I've known Scott for over 25 years, BEFORE he ever starting in the restoration business. I've seen the Tieman family GTO, in fact, Scott was racing it when I first met him.

I like Scott and really respect the quality of the restorations that he puts out. The problem that I have is that when particular persons in the restoration business are treating like 'Gods' and that they can do no wrong and if they have restored a car it is automatically considered to be 100% correct. Their is no such thing as 100% correct. To my knowledge there is no Pontiac assembly manual that is completely detailed that is or was available for these older cars. These cars were built at different plants over a period of 10-11 months and with different suppliers of parts during that period. Sure, there are some things that can be documented as maybe 98-99% as they were supposed to have been, but I've learned over the years to never say never.

The attitude of some of the judges at National events that certain things were done 100% of the time has driven a lot of people away from these organizations. Just look at the membership numbers. There is a lot of reasons they are falling, and that is one of them. It seems if you are not 'in with a certain group', they you; well I've said enough and will get off my soapbox. And I'm not particularly pointing at just the GTO or Pontiac hobbies, this is happening all across the board.

I knew Scott when he was drag racing his dad's 65 too. He raced Marty Palbykin's 71 GTO Judge at one of the events and Marty lost to Scott. He was working for TRW at the time.

I can relate to that deal as I tried for years to get people (like Pete McCarthy) to agree
that KC Coding of options was DIFFERENT vs other plants and that in some cases each plant might have done things slightly differently. People being human always WANT things to ALWAYS be the same. No one ever got drunk on the line, never had a bad day with the wife, came to work with a "Give a Chit" attitude, had a batch of parts not show up so the boss said "Put these parts on the car and we will swap them out later", had issues with the paint equipment, retired and the New Guy took over, etc, etc.

Then there are the other things that you can't explain that just happened. John V is getting to be an expert on finding those things.


1) You have to money to pay Scott Tieman to do your car, you will have it done the "Scott Tieman" way.

2) The Scott Tieman way has won a lot of people awards at shows over the years.

3) The Judges, at these shows, typically know less than the Restorers of the vehicles.

4) The Judges are most likely to "go along" with a Restorer's opinion of how things were done vs reading about it in the "GTO Restoration Guide" that was dated and as new info became available certain parts of the GRG were ignored.

Nope, some might think of Tieman as a GOD but I just know of him as a friend and outstanding Body-Man who does lots of makes of vehicles. I have never thought of him as "PERFECT".

Tom Vaught

[QUOTE=Jerry H.;4009353]Did you see it before or after Tieman detailed it; which was sometimes in the early 90's?

It was after being detailed, I'm thinking around '94 or so.

A very early 66 pulley,unpainted.I would have to look at the # as i don't remember it off-hand.

Again, an original 2-groove pulley that is plated.

All you others who are responding to this thread, you need to reveal the configuration of your pulleys. Keith, I'm guessing that yours is a single-groove?

Yes - that's correct.

Both the water pump and crank pulley are single groove.

K

Yep,my W/P pulley is single groove,no P/N. KC built in March- 4th week in'65

Larry B.